Where have I been?

This is what has been consuming my time.  Four years ago, right before I started my blog, I was a newlywed in graduate school, preparing for my administrative internship.  My oldest stepdaughter decided she wanted to live with us very unexpectedly, which basically through all of our plans to the wind.  Because of this, I stepped down as the drama director at the school I teach. 

Last year, I was presented with an opportunity to save our drama program by stepping BACK in as director, with five weeks until the musical, which was West Side Story (NOT by my choosing...).  I decided to stay on for one more year in order to do what I have called my "Dream Year," with the play and musical I have always dreamed of doing.  The play was a hugely successful production of Noises Off, which I was told was funnier than the professional production at the Cleveland Playhouse the last time it was here.  Then...Chicago.  A show that I applied to obtain the rights for on countless occasions and FINALLY got them.  The show was amazing last weekend and I am so proud of the kids and my directing staff.  Then on Monday, I turned in my resignation letter.

It is too time-consuming with an almost 17-month old and a nearly high schooler.  A is busy and plans on being even busier when she gets to high school next year and it is so important that I am available for her and Logan as they get older.

Will I return as director?  Maybe. Someday.  But, for now, it is back to blogging, home repairs, DIY-ing, hot glue-gunning, and baking.  I hope you stick around for more.

Easter Centerpieces

I thought I had pinned an inspiration for these on Pinterest but can not for the life of me find that inspiration. So if I stole this idea from you, thank you for the wonderful idea and thank you for making my table look beautiful. These are not pictures from my actual Easter table (more on that tomorrow), but I have them on my buffet in my dining room. I think they are ADORABLE and will definitely be using the idea again.

I have a ton of mason jars from my mother-in-law, who cans during the summer months. She gives us all sorts of yummy things and I always find a way to reuse the jars. I live pairing the different sizes and styles. For this project, I bought a package of burlap, a spool of pretty yellow ribbon, and put my hot glue gun to work!

My original plan was to use daffodils, but my florist said that they looked terrible because of the early warm-up, and the daisies were so fresh and pretty and CHEAPER that I went with this!

Happy Easter!

A few days late...I will be back with more later today! But this is the little man with the bunny and on Easter morning. Too cute for words.

Small Bath Renovation: Phase 1

Back in 2009, when we bought our house, our small bathroom looked like this:

Yes my friends, that is shiny wall paper. It was amazing beyond words.

We did a rushed renovation right before we through out housewarming party and it looked like this:

Sorry for the terrible picture...I have no idea what happened.

I have never been 100% happy with it (oak? WTF were we thinking) so when our toilet sprung a leak, it only gave us more reason to get the renovation under way.  We REALLY want to renovate our big bathroom, but need a working shower to do that.  Which meant we had to renovate the small bath before the big one because the shower stall in the small bathroom is teeny and creepy.

Thus began the demolition of the small bathroom.

We began by removing the crappy yellowish gold tile (one of THREE rooms with it) in the shower stall (which we kept hidden by a shower curtain).  Since we are installing a corner stall, we also needed to remove the wall next to the toilet.  Then we had to take out the old shower stall base.

Crappy yellow tile:

OMG.  I hate this tile.

I definitely wanted in on power tool usage.

No more wall!

And no more shower stall base!

The plan is to reroute the plumbing, install a new vanity or paint the old one an espresso color, replace the medicine cabinet with a pretty mirror and install a new light fixture.  We are also going to retile the floor and install a baseboard (finally).  Oh, and because we are removing the vast majority of the drywall in the bathroom, I get to repaint.  Again.